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Global employment briefing: Austria, January 2015

First, employees who schedule and organise their own working time are no longer required to keep detailed records of the start and end of their working time and their breaks. Only a daily final balance must be recorded, such as: Monday, 8.5 hours.

Second, from January 2015, an individual worker can enter an agreement to waive the obligation to keep records of breaks of up to 30 minutes. In the past, such a waiver was not possible without a workforce agreement.

For workers with fixed working hours, record keeping is no longer required. It is sufficient for the employer to confirm, monthly, that the workers have worked their fixed hours.

Finally, employees now have the right to request, once a month, a copy of their working time records from their employer.

Posting employees to Austria: new notification requirements and sanctions

From January 2015 employers are required to notify the Austrian authorities when posting an employee to work in Austria and must retain a copy of the notification. Although, in the past, non-compliance had no sanction (at least if the posted employee was not subject to Austrian income tax), there are now penalties for those who fail to comply.

Further, it is now clear, following a re-drafting exercise, that the statutory administrative penalties for non-compliance apply with respect to each single employee. Previously, the wording of the legislation permitted organisations to pay one lump-sum penalty for breaches involving a number of employees.

Compare jurisdictions: Employment & Labor: International

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